Dozens of prisoners who fled a jail in northwestern Pakistan after armed militants attacked it have returned but hundreds remained at large on Monday, an official said. More than 150 militants Sunday stormed the prison outside the restive town of Bannu near the lawless tribal region. “Fifty-three prisoners out of the total 384, who had escaped the jail, have returned voluntarily while 11 others were arrested,” senior Bannu police official Iftikhar Khan said. Most of those who escaped were militants, including 34 condemned prisoners. A woman prisoner was one of those who surrended. Ehsanullah Ehsan, spokesman for the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) militant group has claimed responsibility for the attack, which he said was launched to get their special members freed. The attack started at around 1:00 A.M. (2000 GMT Saturday) and continued for two hours, with militants in cars and pick-up trucks shooting and lobbing grenades to force their way into the prison, which had some 944 prisoners. A large number of militants had recently been moved to the jail from neighboring Kohat and Lakki Marwat prisons, which are being converted into centres to rehabilitate former insurgents. A former member of the air force sentenced to death for an attack on former president Pervez Musharraf was among the escaped militants, according to officials. Adnan Rasheed was convicted after a bomb planted under a bridge in Rawalpindi near Islamabad in December 2003 exploded moments after the passing of Musharraf's motorcade. His appeal is pending before the Supreme Court. Authorities shut down the mobile phone network in the area and army troops along with paramilitary forces and police launched a search operation in the area. Pakistan's tribal belt on the Afghan border is rife with homegrown insurgents, Al-Qaeda operatives and Taliban, who are understood to use rear bases in Pakistan to plot attacks in neighbouring Afghanistan. The mountainous region lies outside direct government control and US drone strikes on militant commanders in the region are a key plank in the US strategy to defeat Al-Qaeda and reverse the insurgency in Afghanistan. __
